All Your Base Are Belong To Us... Part 1.

A couple of posts back I started to look at different rule sets available and briefly mentioned the complications that come from basing the minis that we all use to play these games.
Coming from a background of GW games this isn't something I ever worried about and so blindly wandered into painting and basing before I realised this was going to be a thing. this post is about what I've learned so far, mistakes I've made and hopefully a bit of advice for anyone else who's about to make the same mistakes as me. as always any comments that can help me out in this would be great!

Method One: Hail Caesar.

The first thing to mention with Hail Caesar is it is likely to be the system I end up using, the second thing is, huzzah, base sizes don't really matter so long as they're pretty much consistent. Rick Priestley recommends the below sizes although they're not set in stone:

Type of Troops      Standard Size           Large         Small        Tiny

2 deep infantry          16 to 20 models      32 to 40       8 to 12      5 or 6

3 deep infantry          24 to 30 models      48 to 60      12 to 15     5 or 6

4 deep infantry          32 to 40 models       60 to 80     20 to 24     Not Allowed

Cavalry                        12 to 16 models       24 to 32       6 to 8        3 or 4

Light Chariots             4 or 5 models           8 to 10           2               1

Heavy Chariots           2 or 3 models           4 or 5             1               –

Artillery                        2 or 3 models              4                 1               –

Elephants                        1 model                      –                –                –

My Republican Romans are based in pretty much this format as you can see below. Units of 20 bases into three ranks. My opponent is basing to the same standard as this so all is good.

So far in this respect I have the above based and painted and the same again yet to paint with a couple of skirmisher units. Another box of the same troops again and i have a playable force. Success!

Method Two: DBx / Field of Glory.

This couldn't be more different but is also an option I'm looking into. Both systems use the same format for basing. DBA is fairly abstract and uses a 12 bases format per army. Each base has a 60mm set width with different depths per unit type / different amounts of minis per base. The problem arises with there amount of minis you're supposed to fit on a base. As an example, a unit of heavy troops should have 4 models on a 60 x 20mm base. Given the size of modern miniatures this is bordering on impossible so I'm working on 3 per base.

This same principle applies to Field of Glory but without the 12 base limit. The bases are organised into battlegroups, for example 4 - 8 bases of heavy foot forming one unit.

Method Three: Impetus.

This seems to be one of the more popular systems for basing out there but unlikely to be one that I go for now given how I've started. the beauty of this system though seems to be that you can get away with using much less models than others. All units have a certain size which they must follow in the same way as DBx but in this case each is twice as big i.e. 120mm across. Base depth is not critical, nor is the amount of minis per base so you can opt for making little dioramas on each base. I have to be honest, had I known this to start with I would have probably gone with this as an option from the beginning. Ah well!

So that's my potted guide so far to what I've picked up along the way. Complicated right? and this is before we even start to look at how the games actually play...